Shingles?

I woke up around 11 feeling very strange, it seemed that I was worse way worse. So I slid my legs out of the bed to go into the living room, I could hear the girls laughing and watching tv in the there so I knew that everyone must be awake. As soon as I got out of bed and began to walk, I knew immediately something was majorly wrong. I took a few steps and then plopped back down on to the bed. My legs were working. After a few minutes I finally made it to my bedroom door, got the door open and told the girls to get MeMe quick. MeMe came and held me tightly as I tried to walk. My right foot was kicking out, and I had no control over it. This is what they call drop foot. So she helped me get back into bed and I called my mom. She made me an appointment with her primary care physician, doctor Blessey, in Mobile for 2:00 that afternoon. As the day progressed I was getting worse and worse. My speech, legs, tongue, face, hands even going to the restroom was difficult because everything was numb. I decided to take a hot bath maybe it would relax me some. The girls, Hannah and Caroline helped me in the tub and sat in there with me until I was ready to get out. After getting out and brushing my wet hair, I noticed something in my head. Whatever it was it looked like a big raised blonde mole, which blended into my hair. It was located exactly where I part my hair. Once again I told the girls to go get MeMe. She came in and took one look at my head and said it’s a tick. A TICK??????? How in the world did I get a tick in my head? She grabbed some tweezers and pulled it out. YUCK RIGHT!!!

By now we had decided we needed to get to the doctor ASAP. So, I just threw on some clothes and we headed to Mobile. Mom met us at the hospital, and took us straight back into a room. Dr. Blessey came in and observed me. He looked at my head and also the tick that my grandmother insisted on keeping. With no hesitation he admitted me into the hospital. Once in a room they started me on pain medicine and strong antibiotics by IV. Late that night around 10:00 the infectious disease doctor came in, he checked me out and said he thought all my symptoms were caused from my medicine, Tacrolimus, this is the medicine I was taking for my hives. The way he explained it was… It’s like getting a flat tire and running out of gas at the same time.
Two things that happened simultaneously but that aren’t related to each other in any way. Well this is just great, we thought that we knew what was going on but we were wrong. The next morning my symptoms were almost all gone. The neurologist came in and had me do some test, to check my physical and motor skills. He seemed to think everything was good and id be ready to go home that afternoon. The infectious disease doctor came back in after the neurologist and was in shock how much my symptoms had gone away. This changed his mind on my diagnosis. He seemed to think I could also go home that afternoon. Only one more doctor to see before I could be released, it’s now Saturday and my doctor, blessey, wasn’t on call so the doctor who is in with him, Dr. Becker is whom we were waiting on.
He came in and said everything looked better and that I could go home. They sent me home with lots of antibiotics and some cream to put on my bite.

The following week, the infectious disease doctor found mom in the hospital and told her he had been researching and my tick had to be a female wood tick that was pregnant to cause the damage it did. Til this day we still have no clue how I got in and how long it had been there. If you didn’t think the hives were crazy enough, now the tick, my life couldn’t get much crazier. Knock on wood